Thread Tools

I'm very happy with this ruling. Score one for the people, and for the constitution.

Supreme Court: Warrants needed in GPS tracking

By Robert Barnes, Updated: Monday, January 23, 12:32 PM

The Supreme Court ruled unanimously Monday that police must obtain a search warrant before using a GPS device to track criminal suspects. But the justices left for another day larger questions about how technology has altered a personâs expectation of privacy.

Justice Antonin Scalia wrote that the government needed a valid warrant before attaching a GPS device to the Jeep used by D.C. drug kingpin Antoine Jones, who was convicted in part because police tracked his movements on public roads for 28 days.

âWe hold that the governmentâs installation of a GPS device on a targetâs vehicle, and its use of that device to monitor the vehicleâs movements, constitutes a âsearchâ â under the Fourth Amendmentâs protection against unreasonable searches and seizures, Scalia wrote.